Invoicing your work can be done in multiple ways. This is a crucial point when setting up a project's structure.

When setting up a new project, you can choose between multiple invoicing preferences and on different levels. These will be discussed in this article. The billable tracked time will be added up and you'll be able to see how much of your budget is still available. Even if you work with a fixed budget and don't invoice tracked time as such, these budget calculations can still be useful - be it for internal reporting, or checking whether the budget you set out initially was realistic.

Invoicing preferences for the entire project:

• External price per user: in this case, what matters is who performs a task, and not what type of task is performed. Time tracking to be invoiced will be calculated according to this hourly rate. You can set an hourly rate for each user by navigating to Settings > HR. You'll notice you can also add an internal cost per user, which will be used to calculate the profit.
• Price per work type: if you select this invoicing preference, your price will be based on the task and not who completes the task. To set the hourly rate per work type, simply go to Settings > Calendar.
• Fixed price per hour: this allows you to set a fixed hourly rate for this specific project, regardless of who performs which task.

Do note, however, that you not only have the option to specify invoicing settings for the entire project. You can also determine your invoicing preferences for single phases. Would you like to invoice a particular phase? Will you work with a fixed budget for that phase, or does your fee depend on the amount of time and materials you need to invest? These questions will all need to be answered when you create your phases.

Invoicing preferences for the phase:

You are able to select the billing method for your first project phase when creating the project. The phases you'll add later on will have that same billing method by default, but you can of course change that by editing the phase.

• Non-billable: You also have the option to set the entire phase as non-billable, which means that all time tracking for that phase is non-billable by default.
• Fixed price: Here, the set budget is the important value. It doesn't matter how much time or money you actually spend on the project, you simply invoice the budget you set out initially.
• Time & material: if you choose this option, you will invoice the actual internal and external cost. The invoicing preferences for the entire project will have an impact here.

Last but not least, you also have to choose for every individual task or meeting whether it should be billable or not. This, of course, is of more importance in case you do track time in order to invoice it to your customer.

Invoicing preference for a task or a meeting:

• Billable: if you choose this option, tracked time linked to this task or meeting will be added to the budget spent and you'll be able to invoice the task/meeting to your customer.
• Non-billable: this means the related time tracking of this task or meeting cannot be invoiced to your customer. 

Once you've defined all possible invoicing preferences, you can start invoicing. To do so, Teamleader Focus offers two options: either invoice your original quotation or create an invoice based on the project and your phases.

You can find more information about how to invoice your project here.